The rain is falling.

The clouds were tinged with a slight blue, and the sky seemed to be only half clear, and the heavy rain rolled up the yellow mud in the courtyard, by the ruins, and in the streets and alleys into streams of turbidity. Immersed in the rain, there were still all kinds of clanging cleaning sounds, and a worker in a cloak pushed a cart and dragged a wooden basket, still asking the ruins to leave, and carrying away the earth and stones that needed to be discarded, and the whole street, alley, and courtyard were all such scenes.

In the courtyard that originally belonged to the Su family in Taiping Lane, many sheds had been erected at this time, and in the rain, the water droplets leaking from the eaves formed a curtain, and a small figure wore it—or should it be said that he ran through a short rain curtain with a hat, and after reaching the rainless eaves, the small figure looked into a room with a hat. It was a little girl of four or five years old, with a wound on her head and a bandage.

It was only a few days after the earthquake, and the environment was not necessarily good, and the room where the little girl was looking at this time was a little messy, but from the cabinets, the big bed, and the waterproof condition inside, it was already quite good. She glanced timidly at the door, and the man inside saw her and beckoned to her.

"Uncle Uncle......"

The little girl screamed and entered the room, and the man then checked the bandage on her head and tapped it with his hand: "Does it still hurt?" ”

"It's a little painful......"

"Then rest in your room and don't run around."

"No one is there in the room, it's so boring, what is my uncle doing, can Xiaorou help you?"

"This is very dangerous, you can't touch it yet, there is a wound on your head, give you a candy to eat, sit next to it and watch."

The man known as the uncle is naturally Ning Yi, and the little girl is the daughter of an accountant of the Su family, named Chen Jirou. On the day of the earthquake, I was hit on the head by something and bled out, but when I checked it later, the injury was not serious, which was really fatal. At this time, it has only been two or three days, and it is already jumping around.

Although it was raining, there was no leakage in the hut because it was sturdy, and the floor was dry, and a few wooden baskets and sieves were placed on the floor of the room, large and small, and some were erected with benches. These containers are basically powders that have been mixed, and on rainy days, and at the beginning of autumn, these powders are not very dry, so Ning Yi took some and arranged them in a line on the ground next to them.

"Beware of staying away."

After he finished speaking to the little girl, he picked up the fire fold and touched it, and with a "peng", the flames rose with a bang, and then turned into smoke and dispersed. The little girl slammed suddenly, and her body almost shrank around her, but her eyes blinked several times and then widened wide, trying to see the scene in front of her clearly.

Su Tan'er, who came in from outside the door, was also startled, in addition to Chan'er and Juan'er following, Chan'er poked her head curiously, and Juan'er adjusted her position behind Su Tan'er, as if she was trying to make herself mellow, trying to form a line with her aunt and miss, the ultimate goal was not to let Ning Yi see her.

"Xianggong, this is ...... Gunpowder? ”

Su Tan'er frowned slightly and walked over, picked up Xiao Jirou, and looked at the bandage on her head, but her gaze remained on Ning Yi's side. When she married Ning Yi, she would ask about everything, it was a sense of responsibility, and at this time, she didn't ask much about what Ning Yi was going to do, and what unexpected actions she had. It was Ning Yi who blew up the house and burned it down, as long as she saw that Ning Yi did it, she wouldn't be angry, and I was afraid that she would study how to demolish it quickly with her husband. But naturally there was some curiosity and hesitation at this time, after all, gunpowder was dangerous.

"Well, take advantage of the free allocation, this thing is dangerous, and it will be received later, so that people can watch it, and you must not touch the fire."

Ning Yi put the gunpowder into the small wooden barrels one by one, and hammered it tightly. Xiaochan squatted next to her and watched, and then went over to help: "It's the bucket that Xianggong ordered to drag from the Qian family a few days ago." ”

"Something added." Ning Yi looked at Su Tan'er, and then smiled, "It's a rainy day, I hope it's not needed, if not, these are actually not worth it." ”

After that, several members of the family carefully packed the gunpowder into small kegs one by one, and then called someone to bring them to the back of the room where they could store their things. Ning Yi put on a robe and went outside, Su Tan'er hugged the little girl, Chan'er Juan'er followed with an umbrella, and on the side of the road outside the courtyard gate, Xing'er, who was mostly wet, was holding an umbrella in the rain and directing everyone in the family to carry the things in the ruins, what to throw or take in and put away, even Geng Huyuan and others listened to her command. It looks like a girl with a similar leader temperament to Su Tan'er. ,

Seeing Ning Yi and the others, she pulled her wet hair and trotted over with her skirt.

At this time, there were also people from several other families in Taiping Lane on the street, who pushed a cart or carried a frame to pass in the rain, and when they saw Ning Yi, they respectfully called him Aunt Su or Aunt Ning, and there were also people called Young Master Ning and Master Ning, which was quite chaotic, but it could be regarded as a greeting.

After all, it all came down to what happened on the night of the earthquake and the next two or three days. Ning Yi has no specific experience in the implementation of earthquake relief, but in later generations, a lot of information is familiar to him, and he always understands many basic measures. He led everyone to figure out his own affairs, and then went to other people's homes in Taiping Lane to help.

At first, it was just a handy, but in such an emergency situation, many things naturally cannot be hidden. Ning Yi commanded everyone to dig and save people, and when the ability to strategize and command and control the overall situation was revealed little by little, others often involuntarily obeyed his arrangement, and then the whole scene operated very smoothly. After many people were rescued and several disasters caused by recklessness were avoided, everyone naturally remembered him.

This is not something that can be tricked by the sword, and it cannot be called very amazing, as soon as it is revealed, it will shine brightly, and it is originally the temperament cultivated by being at the decision-making level for a long time. If it is an otaku who is present, it is to give him the position of leader, and this person will inevitably be flustered and unconfident, and issuing an order will also make people involuntarily distrust and feel that this person is unreliable. But even if Ning Yi casually said an order to "do this", others would involuntarily feel that "this person has a spectrum in his heart", and very few people would question Ning Yi's momentum at the critical moment, so the whole scene was orderly.

After all, this is a kind of self-confidence that people who have been responsible for a long time naturally develop, and when he really grasps some basic points and can make people obey the order, the rest of the things will seem simple.

Later, he carried things, rescued people, and scolded the people who moved the ruins not to cause a secondary collapse, especially with the cooperation of others, and the fact that the corpses under the ruins were moved away from Taiping Lane for incineration as soon as possible did not encounter much obstruction. In other parts of the city, this was even enforced by soldiers, and almost a major conflict broke out.

Subsequently, several families in this alley were more or less influenced by the couple Ning Yi and Su Tan'er. To be honest, Ning Yi entered the Su family, and he was originally supposed to be called the aunt of the Su family, but some people knew that his surname was Ning, so he used the surname Ning as the title, Aunt Ning, Master Ning, and Young Master Ning, Su Tan'er and the three maids also made a big effort in that situation, but they were women, and it was naturally difficult for others who were not familiar with him to speak rashly.

On the first day after the earthquake, Ning Yi asked someone to drag enough grain from the Qian family to store it, and by the way, he actually asked the Qian family to get two barrels of gunpowder. Today was the third day of rain, and Ning Yi was free to further process the large amount of gunpowder. At this time, the army was actually using black powder, but it was not the best in terms of performance after all, and some places were equipped with firearms to defend the city, and they were thrown down with barrels of gunpowder. Ning Yi made certain changes to the ingredients of the black powder, adding and subtracting, after all, there was no very fine processing environment at this time, but it could always increase the performance a little, and it was barely usable after that.

No matter how good the performance of pyrotechnic powder is, it is greatly insufficient compared to smokeless gunpowder that requires chemical processes, and Ning Yi's enthusiasm for gunpowder is actually due to inertial thinking, which can be simply used for things such as mines and bombs. In fact, there are already sulfuric acid and other substances in this year, he has been tinkering in Jiangning for more than a year, if it is over there, if you really want to get some smokeless gunpowder to appear, or the prototype nitrocellulose of smokeless gunpowder and the like, it is okay, but the initial smokeless gunpowder is indeed too dangerous, so it has been shelved, and he is not willing to hand over these processes to others to do, otherwise Kang Xian's side will have a lot of people waiting to be blown up. And at this time in Hangzhou, just want to respond to an emergency, so I can't do so much.

After all, the ancient economic system and social system are difficult to give Ning Yi enough security, and the first thing to store food is for this reason, and gunpowder is also just in case, not that something is really going to happen. In the past few days, the Hangzhou government has initially controlled the situation in the city, but all kinds of unpeaceful things are still happening. ,

Because of the turmoil, some people in the rivers and lakes took risks, fought for property, and then caused various conflicts caused by the burning of corpses. Fang Zheng on this side of Taiping Lane has passed away in the earthquake, and the deputy Fang Zheng has no backbone, so he has also found Ning Yi in the past few days to discuss repairing the wall near Taiping Lane and organizing young patrols.

In the city, there have been several incidents of people on one street beating people on another, usually because of small disputes caused by individuals, or frictions caused by people organizing to dig up the ruins, and then they quickly expanded, and some beggars and thieves who have lost their homes take advantage of the night to look around in the ruins for money and belongings.

Before the rain, everyone was given a day to buffer, but a considerable number of people in the city still had no time to move out of their homes. Large households like the Qian family have enough manpower, and the entire Hangzhou's grain stocks will not suffer too much loss on the whole, but due to the losses of small households, the price of grain in the city has soared in the past few days - even if there is a disaster, after the initial control, there are still people who take the opportunity to open stores and take the opportunity to raise prices in order to make huge profits.

After seeing the situation of his own house in the heavy rain, after a while, the deputy fang was coming over, and he pulled Ning Yi to visit the families of some of the deceased in the alley, and Ning Yi also went over. At the end of the alley, the mother of a wealthy businessman surnamed Tang was crushed to death by a collapsed house, but her son was later rescued by Ning Yi. The deputy fang was probably about to nominate him to be in charge, and then mentioned various contacts with the government, and couldn't help but talk about his status, he said a few perfunctory words, his heart gradually became disgusted, and pushed the matter back, and the coachman Dongzhu, who was sent to inquire about the affairs of the city, had also returned, and was taking off his robe, and then began to report what he had seen and heard.

"I don't know what's going on, although it's raining heavily, there seem to be more and more displaced people from outside the city. The fallen city wall is already being repaired, and the military masters of the Wude camp have sealed the city, if it weren't for the post given by my uncle, I'm afraid I wouldn't have been able to get in. Those homeless people can't come in, and they make trouble outside, and although the people in the yamen are also putting grain for disaster relief, the people in Chengli can't get enough to eat, and the homeless people outside the city are about the same......"

Let Dongzhu go out, the main thing is to observe the situation outside the city. Su Tan'er listened and sighed.

"There was already a war in the west, and the displaced people were running this way, and this earthquake, all the affected people in ten miles and eight towns came over."

Ning Yi thought for a while and said with a smile: "In the past, we were in Jiangning, and there were some small disasters, and people from nearby also gathered in the city, right?" ”

His words were somewhat confirmed, and some were tentative, after all, he didn't know exactly what the situation was like in the past. Su Tan'er glanced at him, thought for a while, and then nodded: "Yes, in fact, there is always more in the city than in the countryside, and there is the government in charge, so in order to starve to death, there is always to put grain...... What was Xiang Gong thinking? ”

"The rice is almost ripe, at most a month and a half, and this season's rice will be cut. Earthquakes are big to say, but except for the people who were crushed to death after the house collapsed once, the rest can always find some surplus food to survive this time, why do you come so many at once......"

"Xianggong thinks there's a problem?"

Xing'er over there also stared at her: "Fang, Fangla?" Uncle means ......"

Ning Yi smiled and shook his head: "No, it should be that I think too much." There are a lot of displaced people from the west, and we have only been here for two months, and I don't know how many displaced people there will be before Ludao, and it is not very responsible to say more without reference. There is no shortage of powerful people in Hangzhou, and there should be consideration and prevention of these things. But...... It's a pity that the river collapsed, otherwise I would rather get a boat and return to Jiangning a few days later, anyway, I was ready to leave at the beginning. Now, if you want to go by land, there is no need for the displaced people to disperse. By the way, is there anything going on in town? ”

Dongzhu thought for a while: "Oh, the Qian family, the Mu family, and several others started selling grain this morning, and the price is three times as much as before, but it is much cheaper than others." In addition, it has been raining for a few days, and Chengli is digging around to say that the matter of burning the body is not as urgent as a few days ago, and some people in the north of the city fought with the military master who dragged the corpse this morning, and the fight was really bad, I heard that one was killed on the spot, and now they are in trouble with the government office......",

Ning Yi frowned, the big landlords would start to level the price of grain, this was expected, although most people regarded merchants or landlords as heinous, but such a chaotic Hangzhou City was not in their interests at all. The best way to do this is naturally to carry out a new round of mergers and embezzlements throughout the recovery process, but the matter of corpses is ......

"It's raining so hard, and it shouldn't matter if it's buried later." Su Tan'er thought about it and smiled, although she also knew the necessity of burning the corpse, but as a person in this era, there is always a certain rejection of burning people directly after death, relatively speaking, this heavy rain has given everyone a chance to buffer. However, seeing Ning Yi frowning, she asked in a low voice, "Xianggong?" ”

Ning Yi smiled and did not speak.

That night, the heavy rain seemed to have a tendency to abate, the couple stood by the window of the shack and looked out, the room was lit with lights and candles, the room was simple, but for Su Tan'er, it was really a warm light, and occasionally people walked by outside the house, or there was a trivial conversation. She was also tired for a day, put on a single dress after taking a bath, and held Ning Yi's hand: "What is Xianggong thinking?" ”

"If the rain stops tomorrow, I want to go to the city gate to see what it's like outside, Dongzhu said that there are a lot of people, I don't know how many people there are after all."

Su Tan'er rested her chin on his shoulder: "Let's go together...... Does Xianggong still think it's dangerous here? ”

"I can't talk about it." Ning Yi put his arm around her shoulder, "I would feel that if I were Fang La, I would take the opportunity to fight Hangzhou's idea." But I don't know anything about the strength and deployment of the Wude Battalion, the control of the Hangzhou government over this side, and even the situation on Fang La's side, so there is no basis for saying this. Intellectually speaking, the command, speed, and combat effectiveness of the peasant army must be very problematic, Hangzhou is not without talents, and Lu Tuizhi's people are not straw bales, they were able to block Fang La before, and now they will definitely be more vigilant, so from this point of view, I am more inclined that there will be no accidents in Hangzhou, just to take a look...... Taking a step back, if Fang Lazhen was going to take this place, he shouldn't have reacted so quickly......

Su Tan'er nodded, she was in a somewhat lazy mood at this time, and she didn't want to think too much about things by Ning Yi's side, and then she heard Ning Yi say: "It's a corpse, it's a problem." ”

"What's wrong?"

"If I were Lu Tuizhi, I would arrest someone today and kill a group of people directly. It was announced to the public that this group of people colluded with Fang La, deliberately left the corpse, stirred up contradictions, and plotted to seize the city in chaos. After this matter is announced, everyone in the city will no longer have any objections to the disposal of the corpse, and there will be a lot less trouble in the future......"

"But there's going to be chaos in the city......"

"There is no chaos, no one believes that Fang La will not fight Hangzhou's idea, and with the power of this killing, he will justifiably strengthen the control inside and outside Hangzhou, and deal with war preparations. First, under this kind of chaos, the situation in the city can be controlled more quickly, and second, it is necessary to prevent it from happening before it happens, and eliminate the possibility of real chaos. In this situation, a high degree of centralization and vigorous action is the best policy......"

He then laughed again: "Of course, if you really want to do this, the prefect will encounter a lot of trouble, and the officialdom will intrigue, and this extreme method of restricting power will definitely meet with great resistance...... I'm just thinking about it. ”

The wife said "um", and then said softly: "It's Xiaochan's matter, it's postponed again, and there is also the matter of the poetry meeting, Xianggong obviously made such a good song, and in the blink of an eye, there was an earthquake......"

For this, the wife who loves the reputation of her husband and a talented son has always been a little worried.

Also at night, at the other end of the city, there are also people looking at this rain curtain in the dark, there is light on the other side of the rain curtain, among the ruins, there is a hastily erected mourning hall and grass shed, but half of the mourning hall has collapsed.

There were two people who spoke.

"The heavy rain looks like it's going to stop, and when it stops tomorrow, the Hangzhou government will no longer be able to ignore the bodies that haven't been dug up...... Hahaha, I'm afraid the smell will come out when the time comes......"

"If it's hot, the body will probably be exhumed by this time, but the heavy rain has helped me to wait. As soon as this urgency was delayed, they thought that they were lucky...... But it won't stop tomorrow, and it should be the next day. ”

"That's right, let's get more prepared. One more day later, Buddha Shuai, Xin Xingzong, Liu Dabiao and others should also come. Stone-chiseling, you seem to have said something before, God doesn't take it, but suffers from it, isn't that what you said? Haluha, according to me, this Hangzhou should be given to us by God...... It's a pity that it was shocked like this......",

"Heaven does not take it, but suffers from it; When it doesn't work, it suffers from it...... We were about to go this way, and it struck an earthquake, probably providential...... Once this place is taken, Brother Shi Nang and Brother Dao An will respond everywhere, and the matter in the southeast should be decided. ”

"Ha Luha, you're always crepe. I said that you are so knowledgeable, why did you always chisel stones in the mountains before, and it would be better for you to come out and be a teacher. ”

"No, I would rather hide in the mountains and chisel my rocks than come out and teach a bunch of boys to read their books......"

"Learned, not understood. But it doesn't matter, I'm Shi Bao a rough person, I'll do whatever you say, and I'll kill whoever you say. Ha Luha, when the time comes...... Like you said, the southeast is decided, the Holy Father will be the emperor, let him give you a prince, and I will be a general. When the time comes to go to the brothel, it's not like you can prostitute whatever you want...... Tsk, I heard that there are many beautiful girls here in Hangzhou, I hope they will survive, I don't bully them, I give money, haha......haha

The laughter went away a little arrogantly, and the black shadow standing in front of the window here looked at the rain curtain and was quiet for a while, and laughed: "Heh, if it weren't for the fact that chiseling stones is more profitable than teaching, who zuihaokan.com the update the chisel of stones." Good question......" He sighed and cast his gaze a little further, the whisper that vibrated through the rain.

"I'm just waiting for this day......"

The next day, the rain was still falling, just a little lighter. After breakfast, Ning Yi, Su Tan'er, and Chan'er still drove the carriage, left Taiping Lane, and walked towards the city gate, ready to see the situation outside the city at this time......